I back the women. Absolutely. Would be nice, though, if the women wouldn't lump me in with the abusers by claiming that my entire field/group/hobby/gender/whatever has a problem.

Holy crap I didn't realize that. A self-selected online survey? And based at that absolutely meaningless metric, "science has a sexual assault problem?" Fuck that.

Also, whether a woman finds an advance to be "harassment" or not depends on whether or not she's interested in the man.

So let that be a lesson to you. If you want to avoid harassment:

1) Be handsome

2) Be attractive

3) Don't be unattractive

Agreed. I'm sick of getting lumped into a "victimizer group" constantly. There are assholes who harass and assault women and should be dealt with. But it's got nothing to do with me.

Sexism absolutely exists. There are those who, upon learning Steve is bad at math will say, "Wow Steve, you suck at math." But upon learning that Amy is bad at math will say "Girls suck at math."

But without irony, men in different groups are lumped together because of the actions of some assholes.

Some women are harassed in field research and therefore "science has a sexual assault problem?" No, the assholes who harassed the women have a problem.

Last month we had the "gamergate" blow-up where some troll on the internet threated a woman who was involved with video games. Thereafter we had to hear that "gamers have a sexism problem." No we don't. That deranged asshole has a problem. Not "gamers."

I play games. I'm not a sexist. I...work in engineering but have conducted scientific research at a university and have published papers. So, I'm tangentially a scientist. And I'm not a sexist. The media people who write these stories need to stop the sweeping generalizations and quit lumping me and people like me in with a few assholes who happen to have the same interests I do.

So, "your hair looks nice" is sexual harassment?

Still, though, my cat has never figured out he will never catch the Red Dot of Mystery.

And back in the day, slaves. Tired of working you fields? Gather up the men, invade the neighboring tribe and capture their people. Takes you a few days, maybe a week. Now you can sit back and let these people till your fields for the rest of their lives. Slavery is extremely economically advantageous.

Actually, I read in Will and Ariel Durant's Story of Civilization that every prehistoric community practice cannibalism. When you fought the neighboring tribe for access to hunting/gathering grounds, there was no need to spare them. You killed them and ate them. You couldn't keep them as slaves because there was nothing for them to do that's helpful to you. You'd have to give them weapons to hunt which would be used against you. It wasn't until the invention of agriculture when you could force people to stay in one spot and work your fields to feed you that it made sense to keep them alive and use them as slaves. Agriculture and slavery ended cannibalism (mostly).

What'll be really interesting to watch is what happens in Saudi Arabia. The entire country is run by oil money. Every citizen gets paid by the government in accordance with their family standing. Nobody actually works. Even the poor have servants imported from Africa that they pay with their oil money. Once that runs out...holy shit that's going to be messy.

While we're at it, let's blame him for Mondays, New Coke and the Star Wars prequels and call it a day.

Same thing with Orwell. I had a conservative friend try to tell me Orwell was a capitalist because he wrote Animal Farm. No, he was a socialist. He wrote Animal Farm as a criticism of Stalinism (totalitarianism with the drapings of communism). Also, as a comment on the self-censorship of English socialists who looked the other way with regards to Stalin's purges and other atrocities because they just really wanted this experiment in communism to work so badly.

Time travelin', eh?

Battle of Fort Sumter.

I'm sure they would want to sell. I'm saying sanctions would probably prevent US companies from buying.

I do, I absolutely do. But what's the US going to do? Re-invade Iraq?

At least maybe this time it would be easier to get a "coalition of the willing." Maybe an international effort that included other Arab nations would make for a more stable country. But seriously, we go in, invade, innocent people die anyway, and a power vacuum is left for even worse motherfuckers to rise up.

It doesn't seem like you can win peace with bombs.